


Long Shot

by mcdowella



Category: RCN Series - David Drake
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-09
Updated: 2014-03-09
Packaged: 2018-01-15 04:34:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1291525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcdowella/pseuds/mcdowella
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adele Mundy visits a world run by a nasty dictator with the open support of a large contingent from the Alliance of free stars. She has herself, Daniel Leary, Hogg, and Tovera.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Long Shot

Long Shot

 

"The alliance observer is approaching", warned Tovera.

"Thank you," said Adele. "There will be no need to kill him." She had spoken precisely, but incompletely, so she corrected her error. "So please don't."

Some minutes later the observer arrived, and knocked on the wood by the open library door.

"Please," said Adele, "do come in."

"I'm the Alliance observer, Lady Mundy", said the alliance observer. "Um, well... Thanks for being so sensible while you were here. Believe it or not, you have quite a reputation in certain circles of the Alliance."

Adele looked up at him. "I don't doubt your word in the slightest, Mr Black," she said.

The Alliance observer looked down at her from his considerable height, supported by muscles honed by a gruelling regime of weightlifting and unarmed combat practice.

"They told me not to let you provoke me into challenging you to a duel", he said, smiling, "so please don't take a few questions the wrong way. I have a report to write in a few days, when you leave."

"I believe in the free exchange of information between professionals and scholars", said Adele, "Subject, of course, to the requirements of their jobs and their superiors."

"Yes, well..." said Mr Black, "It's been very quiet." He laughed. "I almost said, too quiet."

Adele sighed. "Shall I summarise the facts that I believe we both hold?" she asked.

"Yes," said Mr Black. "That sounds like a good idea."

"New Munich has been alternately a neglected Cinnabar client and a neglected Alliance client," said Adele. "never having been strategically or commercially important enough for either party to integrate it thoroughly into their polity. For the past century or so, it has had both de facto and de jure independence, with a three-way treaty which requires both the Alliance of Free Stars and the Republic of Cinnabar to station missions here, each headed by an observer. However, the current supreme leader of New Munich regards most Cinnabar citizens as degenerate sub-humans, and is thought to torture and kill them when he can get away with it, so the Alliance Mission is large and works hand in glove with the local authorities, while the Cinnabar mission is small, and maintains a low profile, except amongst scholarly and cosmopolitan circles."

"Do you get danger money?" asked Mr Black.

"No I do not!" said Adele. "Mr Black, do you accept that my services to the republic are not motivated by money?"

Mr Black stepped back. Adele's voice showed no emotion, but she had raised her hands from her desk, and her eyes stared into his, as they would on the duelling court, acquiring her preferred target for the small iridium pellets of the pistol she favoured.

"Yes, Lady Mundy," he said. "And your file says the same. I apologize."

"Thank you," said Adele. She smiled. "As it happens, I am paid as a senior warrant officer in the RCN, and I do not judge the risks of this assignment to be higher than those of routine RCN space duty. The supreme leader has similarly criticised and treated certain New Munich minority groups, so I am not his only target, and I may be something of a special case."

"I don't understand..." said Mr Black.

"The supreme leader's contempt of Cinnabar may date back to his youth," said Adele, "when he was a struggling young writer on Cinnabar itself. His stories were repeatedly rejected by the major publishers, but he received some help from my parents."

"Did they like his stories?" said Mr Black.

"My Mother regarded them as a heart-felt sarcastic indictment of the repressed violence and decay of what we are pleased to call civilised society," said Adele. "My Father thought they were the sick ravings of a dangerous lunatic, but, as a politician in opposition, he wished to take a stand for freedom of speech."

"And you," said Mr Black, "do you follow your Mother or your Father?"

"I regard them, like most writings, as potentially useful information," said Adele. "In fact, they have so far been very accurate guides to his subsequent actions. Of course, those actions need to be evaluated by their consequences on innocent victims. They cannot be justified as sarcasm, or as indictments of anything except their perpetrator."

"I see," said Mr Black. "So they chose you because you wouldn't get up the supreme leader's nose?"

"I did not ask my superiors why they selected me, or guarantee any particular achievement," said Adele. "I told them that I would apply my skills to the best of my ability, and that previous experience suggested any successes would not necessarily be those expected at the outset of the mission."

"I thought there'd be trouble when he challenged Captain Leary to a duel", said Black, "but you cooled that down, somehow."

"I did not need to ask Captain Leary to decline the duel," said Adele. "Captain Leary's upbringing as a country gentleman did not give him either a taste for duelling or the specialised skills of a duellist. In any case, he did not feel that the supreme leader, viewed with the eyes of Cinnabar society, had a status that required that Captain Leary answer his challenge. I did not attempt to dissuade the Supreme Leader from duelling with Captain Leary. He has stated that if he ever sees Captain Leary again, he will feel entirely justified in attempting to kill Captain Leary by any means he finds to hand. This is entirely consistent with reports of his previous behaviour with other people he has taken offence at. Indeed, the only unusual factor here is that he has chosen to present this behaviour as that of a duellist in polite society."

"And so Leary made himself scarce," said Mr Black.

"I have devoted much of my time here to retrieving and analysing publicly available information," said Adele. "This includes records of what are generally called dragon-hunts. Both Captain Leary and I were interested in hunting and migration patterns of New Munich dragons."

"Dragon-hunting is the sport of kings," said Black, "Or supreme leaders, I suppose. But I thought dragons were completely unpredictable. I thought that was the point."

"Captain Leary is an accomplished amateur naturalist," said Adele, "and animal behaviour intrigues him. As for my contribution, I haven't encountered any local scholars who couldn't learn from the work of the late Mrs Boileau."

"So you've been giving them courses," said Mr Black.  
"We have been discussing pre-hiatus history," said Adele. "The original founders of this planet had a distinctively different viewpoint on a turbulent period during which politics took forms quite different from those that Cinnabar and Alliance citizens see today. It has led to some fascinating academic arguments."

"Completely crazy, those.." said Mr Black, stopping himself far too late. But Adele was smiling.

"Mr Black," she said, "you have the might of the Alliance behind you, and the full cooperation of what we are calling a totalitarian state in our discussions. I did not expect to keep these discussions a secret from anybody, let alone you. In fact, if you also attended to my lectures on information retrieval, you should be capable of tracking down anybody in this planet with an interest in the subject, or, indeed, anybody who is dissatisfied with the supreme leader.”

"One hundred and fifty three of them," said Mr Black.

Adele frowned. "That covers only those with direct or indirect contact with me," she said. "If my lectures were as clear as I intended, you should be able to find many others. The Supreme Leader does not only regard personal loyalty to himself as a necessary qualification for holding power: he regards it as an entirely sufficient qualification for any post. He has alienated professionals in all disciplines. He has alienated those who initially supported him in the belief that they would be the power behind the throne. His party clings to power only because he, himself, extracted oaths of personal loyalty from all military officers."

"Hang on a minute," said Mr Black. "Let's get this straight. This planet's in the grip of a dangerous madman, who kills and tortures Cinnabar citizens for fun. This is the same Cinnabar that once started a war because a Cinnabar citizen got their ear cut off. The great hero Captain Leary has declined a duel with the supreme leader, and gone off to follow dragons somewhere. The decorated and deadly Adele Mundy has talked to a lot of well-connected locals about ancient history, but I know who they are, and I should be able to find out who all of their friends are. That's what I'm supposed to put in my report?"

"That is not precisely correct," said Adele. "Captain Leary never actually declined the duel. If there was such a thing as an adjudicator for duels, he would probably say that Captain Leary's behaviour was in itself a deadly insult, and that the supreme leader's response meant that a duel was in fact in progress. More generally, well, that depends on you. If I supply a sentence or two for your report, will you record them accurately and report them verbatim, whether or not they appear to make sense to you?"

Mr Black’s gaze fixed on the light in the centre of the room's ceiling for a while, until he brought it back to Adele with a jolt.

"Almost as if every word you spoke was being recorded for future analysis," he said.

"You seem to have expected Cinnabar to storm in with a fleet of battle-cruisers, or with some sort of para-military equivalent, to break this world from the ever-tightening grip of the Alliance. That would be a treaty violation equivalent to a declaration of war. However, the treatment of Cinnabar citizens in New Munich sets a precedent that the Alliance must find deeply troubling. What if Cinnabar were to stand by while such behaviour was meted out to Alliance citizens? Ahh… influential Alliance citizens, that is. I believe that this dilemma is the reason for your presence here, and I believe your selection means that what happens here is joint cooperation, and not treaty violation."

"I don't understand any of that," said Mr Black.

"I did not guarantee that you would," said Adele. "I believe that I have been unusually co-operative, given our positions as representatives of our two systems, and indeed given my reputation. I believe that this interview is at an end."

"What do you mean?" said Mr Black. Tovera shifted very slightly, but very quickly. It couldn’t have been emotion; it might have been preparation. "Oh, OK," he said. "Thank-you, Lady Mundy, you've been very helpful." He turned and left.

"What did you think of him?" asked Adele. "He appears to have put a lot of effort into developing his physique."

"Overconfident," said Tovera. "His staff's even worse. They've had it too easy out here."

"I have a proposition for you," said Adele, "If there should happen to be any political trouble while we are here." She caught Tovera's eye. Tovera raised her eyebrows. She didn't do that naturally, but she had learnt that it was a gesture of interrogation and encouragement.

"Let me look after myself. Get him, and any reports and files he has, safely off planet, and you may use any efficient means you wish."

Tovera considered. "If there was any trouble, would it be for him or you?"

"For him," said Adele. "The current government does not regard me as a threat, and any rebels would not regard me as a target. Mr Black, however, has become closely identified with the current regime." She raised her voice slightly, and looked at the light fitting in the centre of the ceiling. "I am asking you to guard him with your life, should it ever happen to become necessary, for the good of Alliance-Cinnabar relations."

"Very good, Mistress," said Tovera.

 

Daniel stood in full dress uniform at the edge of a clearing. He was holding a rifle, and his foot was raised above a pedal switch.

"This is stupid," said the ground further within the forest. Actually, it was Hogg under a camouflage net.

"I'm an RCN officer, not an assassin," said Daniel.

"That wog doesn't just hunt dragons," said Hogg. "You know that, don't you? He shoots people from that light-flier of his. Her ladyship said so. He's had lots of practice at it. He shoots women and children, too, and they're a lot smaller targets than you are."

"That's why I'm not an assassin," said Daniel. "If you want to help, you can keep down, shut up, and let me concentrate."

 

With a dramatic whooshing sound, a New Munich dragon passed overhead, just skirting the edge of the clearing. Daniel could see sunlight through the gossamer-thin membrane of its wings, stretched out by ribs as strong, weight for weight, as any synthetic material known. He wrenched his eyes from the glorious sight to pick up, just, the light-flier far behind it. He pressed down on the pedal and a flare flew up from the centre of the clearing. The light-flier turned in the air. Daniel brandished his rifle, raising it high above his head. The light-flier appeared to shrink as it turned to point directly at him. The light-flier appeared to flash, and shortly afterwards a tree on the other side of the clearing fell, its crown in flames.

 

"Stupid wogs," muttered Hogg, "what do they know about fire discipline? More likely to hit me than anybody else, that's what."

 

Daniel lined up his sights and waited. Even an expert shot with a mounted weapon on a light-flier might be justified in firing before they could guarantee a hit, as the sturdier barrel on their weapon could fire many more shots before heat affected its accuracy, and indeed usability. Daniel would have to make every shot of his count, but then he hoped that the supreme leader was not an expert shot. More and more flashes appeared, and the line of falling vegetation came much closer, passed beyond him, tracked back... but then Daniel's senses narrowed down to his sights, the light-flier, the feel of the breeze on his cheek, the weight of the weapon, and whatever other inputs an upbringing as a country gentleman and expert game shot had burned into his being. Now felt like the right time to fire, and now, and now, and... the light-flier was dodging with the skill of a master pilot, or it was out of control. In either case, there was no point in firing. The flier, or at least most of it, hit the trees at the left side of the clearing about half way up. They shattered, creating a crescendo of destructive noises that terminated somewhere out of sight.

 

"I'll just make certain of our bird, young master," said Hogg, getting up from his trench, rifle in hand. "No need for you to blunder in upsetting people in that party suit."

 

"We'll both go," said Daniel. "Just in case. Anyway, I have the distress beacon."

 

Mr Black sat in his office in the centre of the Alliance mission, studying reports from Alliance experts integrated into the supreme leader's guard. Had the supreme leader finally earned the hatred or fear of somebody in a position to do him harm, or had the locals simply been unable to maintain a modern light-flier? Was Lady Mundy finally living up to her reputation? If so, how could she find and destroy a light-flier driven by a madman of unpredictable whim, following a creature whose unpredictability was proverbial, all the while not triggering a single alarm on a custom-built suite of electronic warfare equipment that would not have disgraced a front line Alliance battle-cruiser? He saw one of his staff approach him nervously, holding several sheets of printout. He took them while the man stuttered ineffectually.

 

"OK Davis, let me see that. Yes, this seems to be a list of opposition leaders, with CVs, oh, I didn't know that. That's interesting. This is fine work, Davis."

 

"Davidson, sir," said Davis, no Davidson. "Umm, this isn't my work. This is from the open net. It all checks out, though. Who's doing our job for us? Why would anybody print out a list of targets? I mean, this is practically an entire government in waiting, except for some of the funny titles. What's an attorney general? What's a supreme court?"

 

Somebody else came running, "There's more, Fred," they said. "Except this lot are all in the military. They're going to be so stuffed. I mean, we've got so many people bang to rights there's going to be more people in prison than out of it. Um, except absolutely everybody is going to have this information too. I guess they'll all be running for it. Won't they?"

 

Black felt the world turn upside down. "Davidson," he said, "What does it mean when there are more opposition than loyalists, when the opposition knows that they outnumber the loyalists, that they're more professional, that they can all trust each other, that they have an organisational structure they know how to work, and that they have access to at least as much military force as the gangsters, I mean loyalists?"

 

"I don't know," said Davidson. "This has never happened..." but he was cut off.

"Mr Black, sir", said Janice on reception. "There's a.. a person for you. She says it's time to go. She says it's important."

"Is it...." started Mr Black. "Ah, can you put her on screen, please?" He saw Tovera.

"Right," said Mr Black. "I have a previous appointment. Carry on. I'm sure you all know what the Alliance expects of you. Um... If you happen to get a call from the Cinnabar observer, answer it and be very polite. We have treaty obligations to each other."

"Sir," said Davidson, "With all this crashing about our ears, you expect us to worry about the health of some sort of Cinnabar spook? What are we supposed to do?"

"If that call does come in," said Black, "I expect it will be a very polite Cinnabar aristocrat, with the backing of a new government, worrying about your health. I suggest that you give her suggestions careful consideration. I'm sorry, but I really do have to go now."

 


End file.
